The congregation was numerous, and the communicants nearly a thousand. I preached a short sermon, and while they were partaking, i spoke a few words of encouragement, and bid them depart in peace. I expressed to them in the former exhortation my fears respecting the formality which obtains among all people, and urged them to devote themselves truly to Jesus Christ. After that i partook of the third table. On the whole, this Sabbath was not like the last. Then i was very much affected, now i was barren and dull. God, however, is the same, and His Word is unchangeable, and in that is all my hope. Woe to me if i were saved by my frames; nevertheless, i would never willingly be in a bad one. At six in the evening i preached again to those who understood English; but they were few, and they seemed not to understand me.
Charles Simeon, Pastor of a Generation. Handley Moule, P130
Woe to me, says Simeon, if i am saved by m,y frame of mine, and woe to us all if we let our feelings guide us. Some mornings we're up and leaping out of bed. Ready for the word, ready for prayer, ready to meet with Jesus once more. Some mornings, it's ten more minutes, it's let me check twitter, it's let me see what the weather's doing. But all our hope as Christians is, as Simeon says, in the unchanging God and His Word. Christ sits and the Father's right hand, and doesn't leave there when we're having a bad day. Christ has risen from the dead, our poor frames don't Him back in the grave.
It's so important, to know this, deep in our hearts. To be fed on the truth, again and again, that our salvation is all of Him. Don't look at a decision, don't look at your heart in the moment, look at Christ, and see Him dying under the wrath of God to pay fully for your sins, and then see Him walking away three days later, your salvation bought by Him.
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